Arts & Entertainment
Steps to Stonewall
Early ‘60s D.C. protests laid groundwork for riots, activists say
Editor’s note: This story is reprinted from the June 5, 2009 edition of the Blade.
The widely held notion that 1969’s Stonewall riots in New York’s Greenwich Village were the start of the modern gay rights movement is inaccurate local activists say as they were meeting and picketing years before.
“When people say as you so often hear, that the gay movement started with Stonewall, if I have a chance under the circumstances in which it’s said, I invariably correct them very insistently,” says Frank Kameny, 84, a legendary gay activist widely recognized as one of the great leaders of the homophile movement, as it was then known. “And point out that the movement was just sort of 20 years old already and there was a groundwork.”
Kameny and others who were involved in the early years agree, though, that Stonewall’s influence can’t be overstated, through its significance wasn’t immediately apparent.
Kameny, Lilli Vincenz, Paul Kuntzler, the late Barbara Gittings, the late Jack Nichols and others had been involved in East Coast gay activism for years. An April 1965 picket at the White House by the Kameny-and-Nichols-founded Mattachine Society of Washington was the first of its kind, but involved a small group dressed — at Kameny’s insistence — in shirts and ties for the men and dresses or skirts for the women.
“Things culturally were very, very different then,” Kameny says, describing the scene of an early picket at the Civil Service Commission to protect the inability of gays to get security clearances. “In 1965, men’s shirts were white. Period. There were no other kinds. Dress was very conservative. It changed over the next half decade, changed very significantly … but in terms of those days, if we’re gonna picket to be employed, we have to look employable by their standards.”
A handful of gay groups existed on the East Coast and met regularly as the East Coast Homophile Organizations (ECHO). Those involved say it was a different world.
“Most gay people at the time were not interested in any kind of civil rights activity,” Vincenz, 71, says. “So we were seen as kind of Don Quixotes chasing windmills. I felt they could at least give us some money, but they didn’t do that either. They were worried about their careers and they thought it was a lost cause. They couldn’t imagine it. So I was seen as a crusader and so we were a small group.”
Kameny says it soon became obvious from ECHO gatherings that D.C.’s Mattachine Society was a trendsetter taking on the Civil Service Commission, the qualification of homosexuality as an illness by the American Psychiatric Association, security clearances, the military gay ban and more.
“All those things we were doing, nobody else was doing to any meaningful extent anywhere,” Kameny says. “We had ECHO meetings in October of each year in ’63, ’64 and ’65 and monthly meetings here in Washington, Philadelphia and New York over that period and the Washington Mattachine was doing things and reporting to everyone else what we were doing. Philadelphia had two women … the New York Mattachine had monthly meetings but they were just meetings, they weren’t accomplishing anything particularly. The things that were being done were being done by us here.”
Kuntzler met Kameny one night at the Chicken Hut, a gay D.C. bar, in late February of ’62 and found a kindred spirit. He remembers the sign he made to carry in the first White House protest.
“Jack (Nichols) saw my poster and wanted it, so I let him carry it,” Kuntzler, 67, says with a chuckle. “He ended up in the front of a photo carrying my sign.”
“That was the first time we had any visibility,” Vincenz, who’ll be honored as a Pride “superhero” with Kameny at this year’s Capital Pride parade, says. “Confidential magazine picked us up and put our pictures everywhere. … We’d never had any visibility before that actually.”
One of ECHO’s signature yearly events was an Independence Day protest each year at Independence Hall in Philadelphia. The one held in 1969, though, which turned out to be ECHO’s last, was markedly different. Stonewall had happened less than a week before and changed things forever.
None of the Mattachine activists were involved in the Stonewall riots. Because it was a spontaneous event that quickly gathered steam during a then par-for-the-course police raid on the gay bar, the only people involved were those who happened to be at the Stonewall Inn, a seedy, Mafia-owned dive that attracted drag queens and homeless gay youth, that night. But they heard about it almost instantly.
“We were all in contact through ECHO, so we heard immediately of what had happened,” Vincenz says. “This was a big event that somebody had, so many people fought back against the police.”
Kameny doesn’t remember exactly whom he heard the news from first but says he was “elated.”
In Philadelphia just days later at the ECHO protest, it was clear the formal Mattachine members had some new allies.
“It looked very different,” Vincenz says. “People didn’t care about any dress rules. The Stonewall crowd came over and there we had, we weren’t supposed to have beards and sandals but now we had beards and sandals. I remember two women, black, white, holding a baby and holding hands. It was just new. And there was some of kind of disgruntlement by some of the old guard. This was a new influx of grassroots activists.”
While the Independence Day picket seemed slightly different, it became apparent that things were much different on June 28, 1970 for the first Christopher Street Gay Liberation Day March, a one-year commemoration of Stonewall that morphed into the annual Pride parades.
Kameny, who attended, was dumbfounded by the turnout.
“I remember … seeing this vast horde of people and I was absolutely speechless,” he says. “Flowing in like a river into the Sheep Meadow in Central Park. If nothing else, there it was in front of one’s eyes. It would have been impossible in terms of anything movement-wise prior to that. We had clearly overstepped a line. We had transitioned.”
Cliff Witt, a longtime local D.C. gay activist, accompanied Vincenz to the parade as a camera assistant for the film she made called “Gay and Proud.”
“I had heard of Stonewall before, but I don’t remember how I first heard,” he says. “I had many trepidations. You could not be gay in those days. Lilli was out through her Mattachine work. I agreed that I would be like the press, running along side, but not part of it.”
Back home in Washington, huge changes were underway. The Mattachine Society was winding down, eclipsed somewhat by the newly formed Gay Activist Alliance (GAA, which became the Gay & Lesbian Activist Alliance in the ‘80s), a spin-off of a similar New York group.
Stonewall’s significance is almost universally recognized but it’s not the whole story players active then say.
Kuntzler says Stonewall-type events were also brewing in Washington around that time. He recalls a May 1969 night at D.C.’s Plus One, a gay bar on 8th Street, S.E. It didn’t turn violent and wasn’t as dramatic as Stonewall, but the long line of gay men waiting to get in that Thursday night didn’t turn and run when a mammoth flock of police cars arrived.
“They hardly paid any attention (to the cops),” Kuntzler says. “It just didn’t work, so the cops went away. This was a liberation in a way, too. It was indicative of a profound psychological shift that had started.”
“It was like Stonewall started the mainstream gays,” Witt says. “It sort of started the organization of the gay liberation movement as we came to know it. … It became more militant and demanding and in your face. We weren’t polite any longer.”
Kameny puts it succinctly: “I feel we created a mindset without which Stonewall would not have occurred at all.”
Celebrity News
Madonna to perform at World Pride in Amsterdam
‘Confessions II’ album released earlier this month to rave reviews
Editor’s note: International News Editor Michael K. Lavers and Photo Editor Michael Key will be on assignment in the Netherlands through Aug. 10. They will be covering World Pride in Amsterdam.
AMSTERDAM — Madonna on Saturday will perform at World Pride in Amsterdam.
She is scheduled to appear alongside Stuart Price, Honey Dijon, and other “special guests” at the World Pride Music Festival at AFAS Live concert hall. The Amsterdam Pride Canal Parade will take place earlier on Saturday.
MISTR, a telehealth platform that offers free access to PrEP, Doxy PEP, STI testing, and long-term HIV care, is organizing Madonna’s performance.
Madonna on July 2 released her new album, “Confessions II,” to rave reviews.
She appeared at The Abbey in West Hollywood, Calif., in April. Madonna in June celebrated Pride month with a pop-up performance in New York’s Times Square.
“Everyone here is a work of art,” says the World Pride Music Festival performance poster, referring to a line from “Danceteria” on “Confessions II.”
Movies
‘Heartstopper Forever’ delivers satisfying conclusion
Beloved queer phenomenon shows us hope can belong to everyone
When I wrote my review of the first season of “Heartstopper,” I said that if the series could only be summed up in one word, it would be “adorable.”
After an additional two seasons and a movie length series finale (which began streaming on Netflix July 17), I’m going to make up a new rule and say that I can choose a second word to close things out. By the time I reach the end of my review of “Heartstopper Forever,” in which our adorable Nick and Charlie must face the possibility that their tender young romance may not be able to survive their graduation to college, I hope I’ll have figured which word it would be.
Directed by Wash Westmoreland and written (as always) by Alice Oseman, artist and creator behind the YA webcomic/graphic novel that launched the whole “Heartstopper” phenomenon, this final installment finds a very different Nick and Charlie than we met in those early episodes – yet in many ways they’re still very much the same. Far from the timid and bullied queer lad of the first season, Charlie (Joe Locke) is now boldly out and confident enough to win the election for “head boy” in his final year at school, and Nick (Kit Connor) no longer struggles with being open about his bisexuality; yet as the stress of their impending separation – each to a different college in a different city – begins to become more urgent, both of them fall back on old patterns.
To those of us who have been around long enough to re-examine such a crisis with 20/20 hindsight, that’s bound to strike chords of recognition. To the younger “Heartstopper” fans, however, it’s likely to feel like high drama – exactly as it did for us when we were going through it ourselves. It’s not just Nick and Charlie, either; other characters, like transgender prodigy Elle (Yasmin Finney) and her cis-het boyfriend Tao (William Gao), must also come to terms with the changing dynamics of their relationships. The result is multiple mirrors through which queer teens can see their own experience reflected, which has always been the appeal of “Heartstopper” in the first place. And as it has from the beginning, Oseman’s intent to provide her teen audience with positive perspectives shines through, ensuring that the story’s final chapter lands in a place where hope can belong to everyone.
That doesn’t mean it doesn’t have its share of dark moments – it wouldn’t be “Heartstopper” if it didn’t, would it? Part of the show’s value for its fans, young and old alike, has always come through its various characters’ growing pains; their missteps and misjudgments, their confused emotions, their fumbling efforts at “first times,” their struggles toward self-esteem. All these and more have provided the necessary “weight” to counter the show’s bubbly optimism and keep it from becoming as insubstantial as spun sugar. More importantly, these issues have always been the real core of the story: We love the sweetness of the romance, but the deeper satisfaction comes from watching these young people navigate all their challenges, sometimes alone but more often together, and build a community through the shared experience of working through them.
The final installment, having brought Charlie, Nick, and all the rest to the cusp of young adulthood, brings a suitably more mature level of problems into the mix. Sure, Charlie has grown into the hero he once needed himself, but the uncertainty that emerges between himself and Nick as they ponder their impending separation is enough to spark a relapse of his eating disorder; likewise, Nick may be confident and unguarded about his sexuality and openly proud of being Charlie’s boyfriend, but that doesn’t stop him from slipping back into self-doubt (and bad behavior) when he contemplates the possibility that their love story might be coming to an end. We know they have the “tools” to get back on track, but with everything so up in the air, will they be able to remember how to use them?
So, too, throughout the series, we have seen these kids come to terms with their individual queerness, navigating those personal journeys and learning how to embrace who they are in an environment where, for the most part, they get a lot of support. At the same time, there have been shadows around the edges, encounters and circumstances that remind them (and us) that, outside the protective circle provided by their school and each other, bigotry still exists. In “Heartstopper Forever,” those reminders are still there, and they feel all the more ominous – not just because of the worldwide rise in anti-LGBTQ+ sentiment, though that’s tied to it, but because these bright young things will soon be moving into a larger world where safety and shelter from the hate is not quite so certain.
Still, it’s Nick and Charlie’s story above all else, and naturally the main focus of this finale is on them. There has always been a too-good-to-be-true perfection to their romance, but Locke and Connor are so good at bringing it to life we believe it; here, fittingly for a final chapter, these boys finally face the crossroad that comes with adulthood – the recognition that, one way or another, there will be an ending to their relationship. How they handle that, we won’t spoil; once again, though, this is “Heartstopper,” one can feel sure that Oseman’s characters will work their way through it in the most imperfectly perfect – and emotionally satisfying – way possible.
Deserving of mention: characters like Isaac (Tobie Donovan), Imogen (Rhea Norwood), and Charlie’s sister Tori (Jenny Walser) return to get their fair share of the spotlight, and gay teachers Mr. Ajayi (Fisayo Akinade) and Mr. Farouk (Nima Taleghani) get the chance for a new beginning of their own; and out UK acting legend Derek Jacobi (“I, Claudius”) appears alongside real-life partner Richard Clifford as an elderly couple in a quiet but important scene at the cafe where Charlie works.
With any “franchise” as popular as “Heartstopper,” the task of bringing closure to a story that has emotionally involved so many fans is almost always a thankless one (just ask George Lucas), so there are sure to be some who have objections to the way Oseman brings her beloved story to an end; but it’s her story to end, and in choosing to uphold its sensational (yet sentimental) imagining of the world as it could be, “Heartstopper Forever” doubles down on the idea that we can make it the way that it should be.
That’s why my choice for the second word we can use to sum up “Heartstopper” is “aspirational.” In the relative innocence and un-ironic preciousness of Nick and Charlie’s enduring love story, we can find no excuses; not all of us can keep our first love alive for an entire lifetime (nor, often, should we), but maybe we can learn to follow our hearts as surely and openly as they do.
That’s about as aspirational as any of us can hope to be – but don’t worry: it’s still adorable, too.
a&e features
Rainbows in Revolt on a mission to make LGBTQ artists’ voices heard
Rainbows in Revolt on a mission to make LGBTQ artists’ voices heard
Last month’s Pride celebration in D.C. was so fun. Walking around my first Capital Pride with a $15 lemonade I was loving the madness and the color. Artists and small businesses battling banks you’ve never heard of collecting your personal information so you can spin a wheel to snag free merch. Great music blaring, people actually smiling and enjoying themselves, the “Great” American State Fair could never!
The Monument Stage was on Pennsylvania Avenue, directly in front of the National Gallery of Art and I can’t think of a better venue to see live music. How does someone get on the lineup for Pride? How do we accelerate the visibility of the most talented voices in our community to perform in places like this?
There is certainly not a talent gap, but there is a visibility gap. Chappell Roan went from playing for two people in a parking lot to owning the main stage at Coachella in one year. Whether it is shadowbanning or bias in AI, algorithms have been shown to suppress queer artists. In a digital age, how can queer people break through and show the world how talented they are?
Allison and Matt of Rainbows in Revolt are on a mission to make openly LGBTQ+ artists’ voices heard. Their goal is to find “musicians whose queerness is central to their identity as an artist,” and accelerate them to a place where they can actually reach fans.
The only time queer events seem to be in the spotlight is June, but this should be year round, according to Allison and Matt. Rainbows in Revolt wants to act as a “nucleus” for different sub-communities, finding common ground in the universal language of music.
Matt and Allison founded Rainbows as a way to make cheaper, higher quality merchandise for queer artists. While Rainbows has already pledged 20% of their profits to the LGBTQ+ community, with 10% to Whitman-Walker Health and 10% to LGBTQ+ organizations in need, this is just the beginning of the work that they do.
Rainbows “does the dirty work” that artists normally struggle to do on their own with limited resources. Interviews, artist profiles, social promotion, playlist discovery, radio outreach, and merch-funded support. This work is normally expensive, time consuming, and requires lots of different skills. Musicians don’t want to be editing clips to post online. Standup comedians don’t want to make graphics for their tour dates. They want to write more. They want to focus on their craft.
In addition to helping artists find their audience, Rainbows has built other digital tools to help queer people connect, including an interactive Safe Space Map for most major cities. It is hard to know which places are truly safe and supportive just from a simple Google search. Attitudes and actions change, and there should be a simple way for queer people to find other places that align with them. The Safe Spaces Maps are all up to date, and are tagged and filterable. Instead of relying on forums and word of mouth, Rainbows has created a centralized way to find authentic community quickly.
I had a chance to talk with Allison and Matt at Pride where Lily Erin, one of their signature artists, was performing on the Monument stage. Lily Erin is a folk singer who is familiar and forging her own path. Her bittersweet sound echoes through Acadia, and her garb mirrors the New England athletes I grew up with. Gorp Core meets streetwear. A graphic tee, hiking shorts, and creamsicle Jordans.
Her debut single, “Bus Stop,” tells a sad story about unconditional love, and the conditions that still seem to come with it. Graduating into lockdown, Erin needed a new way to connect with herself and others. Lily made “Bus Stop” without an intention to share it, but doing so was a liberation. People have been responding to her honesty around queer-ness, family, and the “ghosts which haunt us” even in the daytime.
Rainbows in Revolt has helped Lily Erin go from bars and backyards to The Monument Stage at Pride. This is a meteoric rise, and a testament to both Erin’s talent and the work of Rainbows to promote her. “A little encouragement goes a long way with early artists,” and by “planting a seed” Rainbows is already seeing their artist garden grow. Community is power, and Erin is a perfect example of how effective simple modern techniques of promotion can be.
A next step for Rainbows is putting on shows themselves. On Oct. 3, Rainbows in Revolt will host an Evening with Ray Boltz at the National City Christian Church. Boltz grew up in the Catholic Church and for many years was the soundtrack to many services, youth camps, and church groups. He was celebrated by millions until he came out in 2008. Allison remembers her community “never playing his music again.”
Rainbows in Revolt is helping him to return to the church, and proving that identity does not need to be exclusive. We live in a complicated world with complicated lines being drawn. Boltz proves that these lines don’t exist, and will be breaking down barriers to bring together communities. To Allison, “a trans woman standing next to a straight white man in church is a powerful teacher.”
The Safe Space maps bridge all types of spaces, and one of the unlikely ones is, perhaps, churches. Matt said that “BYU has only nine safe spaces around their campus and seven of them are churches.” Not all churches are anti-gay, and many times they are the only place for people to find community.
Rainbows in Revolt is just getting started bridging gaps and building community.
BLADE ENDORSEMENT: Susan Stewart for mayor of Rehoboth Beach
Madonna to perform at World Pride in Amsterdam
‘Heartstopper Forever’ delivers satisfying conclusion
Matthew Rosenstein in ‘Make Me French’ a hit at Clear Space Theatre
White House orders warning signs at Smithsonian over gender identity exhibits
D.C. summer theater offers something for every taste
Summer in the City: Free exhibits, movies, more fill D.C.’s calendar
With gas prices soaring again, a staycation is a good plan
Gary Sutton, known for ‘warmth and laughter,’ dies at 62
White House threatens Anne Arundel schools over gender identity policy
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